Sawbones, Saddle Burns & Soothing Balms

Copyright and Publication Details

© NEIL THOMPSON, FRCS, FRACS

First published 2014

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced,
stored in a retrieval system or transmitted, in any form or by any
means, without the prior permission of the publishers, who make
no warranty, express or implied as to the accuracy or completeness
of any information or photographs contained within this book,
which have been reproduced in good faith.
Enquiries should be made to the publisher.

Published by NGH Thompson

Opposite Page:
‘Hippocrates Examining a Child’,
a painting by Robert Thom, 1950s
(US Library of Medicine)

Page xi Photographs:
Ballina Cottage Hospital, c.1900
Campbell Hospital, Coraki, c.1910
Lismore Hospital, c.1909
St Vincent’s Hospital, Lismore, c.1938

National Library of Australia
Cataloguing-in-publication entry
Author: Neil George Hugh Thompson
Title: Sawbones, Saddle Burns & Soothing Balm:
Medical Practitioners in the Richmond Valley
1866–1986
ISBN 978-0-9873515-9-3
Subjects: Physicians, NSW, Richmond Valley, History
Medicine, Practice, Richmond Valley, NSW
Medicine, Rural, Richmond Valley, NSW
Richmond Valley (NSW), History
Dewey Number: 362.1099441

Designed and produced by Dragonwick
Email: dragonwick1@outlook.com

Healing is a matter of time,

but it is sometimes a matter of opportunity

Hippocrates of Cos, physician (460–371 BC)

Among the conclusions, upon reading this book,
would be that it is a rewarding revelation of the extraordinary
capabilities, self-belief and energy of the doctors—
in those days under conditions of great adversity
and loneliness in a wild land,
leading to laudable clinical outcomes for their patients—
that a lot of kind people are willing to help research the past
and that there are many untold stories of great interest
still ‘out there’ waiting to be exhumed